Alamo City Sees Future in 'New Energy Economy'

San Antonio, Texas, USA --
In the country's seventh largest city, political leaders are betting that green energy and smart grid technology will stimulate economic growth for decades to come.

“San Antonio has the opportunity to seize a mantle that no city in the U.S. holds today: To be the recognized leader in clean energy technology,” Mayor Julian Castro said Monday.

“By building a critical mass around research and development that will grow and attract the brainpower of the 21st Century, San Antonio can be for the new energy economy what Silicon Valley is to software and what Boston is to biotech,” Castro said while announcing an investment-and-incentives package that attracted five clean tech companies to the Alamo City.

San Antonio’s “New Energy Economy” plan includes a six-year, 100% tax abatement for a SunEdison 30-MW solar farm and incentives for the corporate relocations of smart grid firm Consert, LED lighting company Green Star, and ColdCar USA, an electric truck manufacturer.

Also in the package is a 200-MW power purchase agreement (PPA) for clean-coal electricity from Summit Power Group. Summit will manufacture compressed CO2 for oil recovery, urea fertilizer and sulfuric acid at a West Texas facility that promises to capture 90 percent of carbon dioxide and 95 percent of mercury and sulfur, officials said.

Doyle Beneby, CEO of city-owned utility CPS Energy, has said the companies could generate 230 jobs within three years and up to 1,000 jobs by 2015.

“Some may say, ‘Isn’t this risky? What if the political winds change and traditional, non-clean sources of fuel come back in favor?’” Beneby asked during the event Monday at the University of Texas at San Antonio.

In a state that is unapologetically proud of its fossil fuel economy, San Antonio and its pursuit of clean energy are boldly independent, especially at a time when an onshore oil boom, located in the nearby Eagle Ford Shale, has created many jobs in South Texas. Valero, the country’s largest independent refiner and one of San Antonio’s favorite employers, spent millions in a failed effort to challenge California’s clean air laws.

San Antonio may have some competition from a seemingly unlikely neighbor. Political leaders in Houston, home of many oil and gas companies, are also attracting clean energy companies recently, according to Reuters.

The Alamo City’s leaders recognize that an emphasis on renewable energy will have its skeptics.

“We choose to believe that the real what-ifs are: What if the air is so clean in San Antonio in 2018 that the instances of respiratory illnesses go down dramatically (and) what if thousands of new energy economy jobs are created?” said Beneby, who was hired last year after the utility’s previous leadership failed to push through a nuclear expansion at the South Texas Project.

Castro credited Beneby with recruiting the clean tech companies. The deal, the mayor said, highlights the “nexus of sustainability and economic development” because it will help CPS reach a goal of 20% renewable energy by 2020.

Some 859 MW of electricity, about 10% of CPS Energy’s capacity, comes from renewable sources, mostly wind, now. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) named CPS Energy and Denton Municipal Electric as co-recipients of the 2011 Public Power Wind Award.

CPS hopes to install Consert’s energy management software in 140,000 homes by 2015. The company announced its move to San Antonio from Raleigh, NC, after completing a successful CPS Energy pilot program involving 1,000 homes. CPS also plans to retire about 900 MW of coal power by 2018.

“This is exactly what utilities all around the country should be doing instead of considering costly and futile investments in pollution controls for outdated and harmful plants,” said David Power, deputy director of Public Citizen Texas.

The decommissioning of the J.T. Deely coal-fired power plant by 2018 is expected to improve air quality. But environmentalists fear that progress could be hampered by emissions from hydraulic fracturing and truck traffic if South Texas’ oil-and-gas boom expands as predicted.

“The policy makers and the community leaders in San Antonio are very concerned about the high pace of development causing the metro area to go into non-attainment,” said David Burnett, director of technology at Global Petroleum Research Institute at Texas A&M University.

In the meantime, advocacy group Solar San Antonio has been working to avoid such a scenario by making residential solar more accessible through loans from local banks. Beneby said the expansion of utility scale solar will also meet clean air goals.

“There will be plenty of room for us to grow our solar portfolio,” he said.

SunEdison CEO Carlos Domenech (pictured top, right) said San Antonio’s approach has the potential to inspire a new generation of renewable energy projects across the country. He said cohesion among the city, community and municipal utility led to rapid development unseen in other U.S. markets.

“The other thing that is unique is the linkage to the university, which provides an opportunity to create a long term R&D effort,” Domenech said.

CPS Energy’s rates are among the lowest in the state, so the PPA is not mandated by a renewable portfolio standard.

“It really is a self-started initiative that has a new era of energy and jobs as a platform, and that really is different,” he said.

6 Comments

In Washington State we have a similar problem to what #4 says.
Unfortunately, what is needed is to increase revenue to pay for the production and conservation of a sustainable water supply in areas where land is cheap and abundant. Dare I say the 'T' word?

I live in San Antonio and have had a 3 kw solar installation for 4 years generating over 2 MW-h of energy. Meanwhile the population has risen by at least 10%. Unless the population of this area stops increasing, all these efforts will not be sufficient. I guess the political leaders are doing what they can, but they are not solving the problem of continued population growth with the increase in everything including energy. Where will the water come from. Global warming is already moving the climate in the San Antonio area towards desert which is decreasing water supplies and population is increasing demand. The trends do not point to sustainable anything.

Renewable Energy Manufactures/suppliers should use their own product to manufacture.

The manufacturers' of Solar Panels and other forms of renewable energy with related support products manufactures/suppliers - should have at least the decency to practice what they preach what they market to the public.
That would be the best marketing approach I can think off.
If they believe in the product they manufacture/sell, they should utilize it to its fullest potential.
It will give the manufacturer the actual experience of utilizing the product on a daily basis, view and experience any shortcoming or improvements that are needed, implement the improvements and capitalize on that revision to improve the product and its performance.
This will instill confidence in the public to purchase the product.

They really get it. The town and utility really both have incredible leadership considering being under the nose of so much traditional influence. Makes me proud to be from Texas even though now I live in a state whose leaders are too busy trying to woo offshore oil rigs than pay any attention to things like the future and sustainability.

Add Your Comments

Robert Crowe is a technical writer and reporter based in San Antonio, Texas. He has written for Bloomberg, the Houston Chronicle, Boston Herald, StreetAuthority.com, San Antonio Express-News, Dallas Business Journal, and other publications....